SAN JOSE - The Florida Panthers clawed back from a 3-0 deficit to force overtime Thursday night, but lost captain Aleksander Barkov to a leg injury in the second period and ultimately fell 4-3 to the San Jose Sharks at SAP Center when Luca Cagnoni scored at 3:14 of the extra frame.

The loss came with the Panthers already shorthanded. Top-pair defenseman Gustav Forsling, listed as day to day, did not dress. Then Barkov - who missed all of last season with a right knee injury - went down after his left leg bent awkwardly in a battle along the boards in the second period. He headed immediately to the tunnel, throwing his gloves in frustration.

“It’s not related to his injury last year at all,” head coach Paul Maurice said. “He’ll get looked at. We’ll have a good idea by tomorrow afternoon.”

The deficit reached 3-0 before Florida responded. Akira Schmid, making his first start of the 2026-27 season, stopped 10 shots in the first period alone as Mason Marchment - who joined San Jose on a five-year deal during the offseason - opened the scoring at 14:20 with a long shot through traffic. Will Smith then scored shorthanded to make it 2-0, and added a second goal at 10:37 of the second period to push the lead to 3-0.

Forward Eetu Luostarinen sparked the comeback, beating Yaroslav Askarov on a rebound to make it 3-1 at 17:10 of the second. He then tipped in a shot from Dmitry Kulikov to pull Florida within one at 3-2 just 5:01 into the third period. Just 17 seconds later, Matthew Tkachuk beat Askarov with a wrist shot from the slot to tie it 3-3.

“You never want to see your teammate go down, especially your captain,” Luostarinen said. “Hopefully he’s fine, nothing major. Yeah, obviously, we need guys to step up for him.”

Tkachuk, who scored the equalizer, credited a shift in Florida’s approach for the late surge. “I thought our game really got more direct,” he said. “We had more pucks and more guys to the net. That’s how you’ve got to score in the NHL.”

The Panthers survived a late roughing penalty on Kiefer Sherwood that sent 1:43 of power-play time into overtime, killing the advantage before the action went to 3-on-3. Cagnoni ended it seconds later.

“We had a real good push there and a real good push at the start of the third,” Maurice said. “I think we felt we could come back and win it. We’d rather lose it almost the way we did than lose it on that kill [in overtime]. We got a great kill out of it, but couldn’t close it.”

Tkachuk put the result in early-season perspective. “It’s a long year. You gotta grind out points. We would’ve liked to get the extra one in overtime, especially after that kill, which was awesome, but, you know, all in all, we’re down 3-1 going into the third, you’ll take that point and run.”

Seth Jones led all skaters with 27:43 of ice time. Radko Gudas added three blocked shots and four hits, while Brady Tkachuk and Boko Imama each recorded five hits. Anton Lundell won 68.8% of his faceoffs, and the Panthers led 41-24 in hits.

Florida’s road trip through California continues Sunday when the Panthers face the Anaheim Ducks at Honda Center at 8 p.m. ET.